The Hindu Business Line : Pepsi, Coke or neither?

Pepsi's CEO Rajiv Bakshi (above) stepped in to address consumers in the face of a crisis but Coca-Cola continued using its star endorser, both strategies which served to keep the pesticide in cola controversy alive.

With the cola controversy hitting both companies, Pepsi and Coca-Cola took different routes to address consumer concerns. Which was better? And why?

- Pallavi Ratra, New Delhi

Pallavi, I am with neither of the stances.

Pepsi chose to showcase the chairman of the company and Coke chose to stay with Aamir Khan and his charm to do the trick.

If you look keenly at the executions, somewhere both of them seem to end up talking the same language and the same visuals stare back at you. Each one is a defensive stance. Each one reminds the consumer once again loudly the controversy that hit the category. Each campaign spends a substantial amount of money raking up the issue once again, and going all out to defend quality and standards.

The consumer who is watching all this is not totally convinced. The campaigns evoke some degree of doubt and some degree of consumer cynicism that question the cola majors in a rather subliminal manner of asking.

If I were to do this, I would just not take either the celebrity or Rajeev Bakshi (who is now a celebrity, for sure). I would just sit back, allow the controversy to be, and continue with a whole new thematic campaign that did not address the controversial point at all. Enough has been read and said about it. No point re-visiting it at all.

Public memory is proverbially short, as we saw in the case of the previous cola controversy that broke out, cascaded into a tumult, and then just fizzled out. The current cola campaign continues to keep the fizz of the controversy alive. And that, from a crisis marketing point of view, in a very new manner of speaking, is wrong.

As a distribution company in the mobile phone industry what are the various kinds of `below-the-line' promotional activities that can be undertaken to increase the sales and awareness of the product?

- Deeksha Khanna, Chennai

Deeksha, few people think below-the-line professionally enough. And fewer still implement exciting below-the-line activities that can make the brand happen in the marketplace. Professional advertising agencies think more above the line and less below! Equally so, brand managers think much more in terms of building the brand by top-down imagery rather than building the brand brick by brick of the below-the-line variety.

Having given vent to my frustration in that first paragraph, let me talk the mobile-phone and below-the-line language.

One of the first requirements of the category is availability within arm's reach. The second requirement is availability in terms of width of range. The third is visibility. The fourth is jump-out value. The fifth is the ability to connect the product, the brand and its above-the-line messaging to what is at hand. The sixth is the ability of the product to emote with the consumer and seek relevance vis-a-vis the need at hand. The seventh is building on the see-touch-smell-feel and experience parameter, and I can go on like this on ten more needs.

Let me stop here though and focus on some of the key issues and ideas at hand.

What can you do?

Focus first on awareness. Make sure that the above-the-line awareness is interwoven carefully with below-the-line point of purchase awareness. Remember, up to 76 per cent of purchase decisions in the category we are speaking about happen in-store. POP is therefore a very important medium to handle sensitively.

Having done this, the selling line needs to be a credible one. This category requires a very keen and involved integrity-selling model at the point of sale. The salesperson at the outlet is playing a very keen role on this. Train your folks well enough to ooze the honest line, tone and tenor. Remember, below-the-line is all about the experiential element involved in selling and marketing. This needs to be done well.

Look for very new ways of doing below-the-line. Don't toe the line of an activity done by someone else at all. Think new. I do believe you can think the language of the Flash mob as well for this category. Flash-mob activity is all about involving consumers in a viral format of promotion. Here is a way in which the consumer gets involved in below-the-line activity all on his own, of course prompted by the initial push given by you, the marketer.

In the year fast slipping by, which are the brands you would award brownie points of achievement?

- Gurjeet Singh, Bangalore

Gurjeet, this is more a year-end review kind of question, and I would have ideally liked to have waited it out for the year to run through. Nevertheless, here is a sneak preview list of my ratings:

Kingfisher: Dr.Vijay Mallya is doing a Richard Branson out here. Personal branding is out to help the airline. Ask anyone the question: What is Kingfisher? The answer that will come back: Beer. Airline. No one remembers the poor little bird it really is. That's the power of branding. Kingfisher Airlines has achieved a terrific task this year. A seamless branding exercise that does not stop at media, but takes the route of experiential branding ... and does it very well!

Lage Raho Munna Bhai: Otherwise a sequel, the movie has been marketed to the hilt. Audiences are rushing in to see the movie and are coming out mildly excited. Timing the movie release to just a couple of months before Gandhi Jayanthi has been a good move. With the buzz of the Mahatma's 137th birth anniversary, Munnabhai gained to the hilt!

CNN-IBN: Slick programming of the contemporary kind and a forever-on- your-toes kind of programming has helped the channel grab eyeballs. The channel has believed in connecting on-ground activities with on-air programmes. A task well achieved to make the brand truly meaningful to the viewer in a see, touch, feel, taste and smell kind of manner.

Marico: The innovative company campaign has positioned Marico as the "intelligent HLL" or the "intelligent FMCG." Good for its image in the job market. Harsh Mariwala has used his intelligence well.

Infosys: Has grabbed larger than life mindshare among techies, non-techies, and all people alike. The 25th year PR effort has helped build a brand with very little real money expenditure. The involvement of N. R. Narayana Murthy and Nandan Nilekani in the overall macro environment is like saying, "We also do technology!"

Naukri.com: Grabs mindshare through the TVC route brilliantly. A dotcom comes to life and the timing is right, when a whole nation of job-seekers is on the Net. Let me stop at six for now!

(The author is a business strategy specialist and CEO, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc.)

E-mail queries to askharishbijoor@thehindu.co.in

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